Flowers Blooming in Sorrow After the Fog of Love Clears

On the sixth day, my father and Ronald still hadn’t returned from the palace, and everyone at home was on pins and needles.

Some people were even bold enough to toss notes over the courtyard wall, urging me to write a confession to protect my family.

My mother came in with a plate of cookies, her eyes red and puffy. “Emily, try these. I made them just for you.”

Seeing her like that made my heart ache. “Mom, you need to rest. If nothing changes by the tenth day, I’ll do what you all want. I’ll write the confession and end my life in public. I won’t bring shame to our family.”

My mother broke down, sobbing. “Emily, I can’t bear to lose you, but what choice do I have? If you don’t confess, what will happen to your father and brother’s futures? What about the rest of our family? I’m truly at my wits’ end.”

I swallowed the lump in my throat and gently touched her face, now so worn with worry. “Mom, have you ever thought about fighting back against all this?”

Her eyes widened in shock. “Fight back? How? Emily, the world is what it is. We can’t afford to dream too big.”

I lowered my gaze and let out a bitter laugh. “I get it, Mom.”

My mother loves me more than anything. She’d stand in the scorching sun just to bake me an apple pie, and she’d stay up all night by my bedside whenever I was sick.

But like most women of her time, she doesn’t fight back. She accepts her fate. They resent the world but believe that’s just how it is.

I couldn’t help but think of Viola’s mother. Last night, she held Viola close, ready to risk everything. She said, “Viola, don’t worry. Even if it costs me my life, I’ll keep you safe! I’ll beat the drums and take our case to the king. These cursed laws should’ve been changed long ago.”

I couldn’t eat. The places on my body where I’d been whipped needed fresh bandages every hour, but I felt no pain at all.

Finally, news spread like wildfire through the streets.

At this morning’s court session, Viola’s father, Adam Louis, submitted a petition signed by a hundred people, denouncing the unjust laws and the lack of respect for women. He passionately called for the abolition of these oppressive laws.

His words sparked outrage. Most people saw him as selfish, willing to abandon traditions passed down by our ancestors for his own gain.

But a few officials agreed with him, acknowledging the unfairness and supporting the call for change.

The king was furious and had Adam and the other officials whipped ten times each before releasing them.

However, the incident caused quite a stir among the people.

Meanwhile, the members of Awakening Manor had already planned to post large banners in the streets after dark.

Each one would bear the same message: Fight to the end.

That afternoon, my father and Ronald returned, limping.

My father’s face was a mix of emotions, while Ronald looked utterly defeated.

“Emily, I couldn’t protect you. I failed,” Ronald said, his voice heavy with guilt.

I quickly helped him sit down and called for someone to tend to his wounds.

I had thought they’d given up on me, but it turns out that during the three days they were missing, my father and Ronald had been pleading with the king. They had knelt outside the palace for three days straight, only fainting from exhaustion this morning, which finally led the king to send them away.

“It’s okay. I still have time,” I told my brother.

My father called me to his study. His face was as pale as a ghost.

“Emily, I’ve done everything I can. I know you feel it’s unfair, but changing the law is nearly impossible. If it ever comes to that.”

I cut him off. “If it really comes to that, I’ll do as you say.”

He nodded, letting out a long sigh. “Don’t tell Ronald.”

“I won’t,” I replied.

The seventh day came.

When the townspeople woke up, they were stunned to find large posters plastered on their doors. The entire city fell into an eerie silence, its usual energy completely drained for the day.

The real shocker came when Princess Angela publicly called for the abolition of the unfair laws against women. Princess Angela, the king’s younger sister, had seen her older sister, Princess Sandra, die after her veil fell off. Despite her hunger strikes and protests, Sandra had never received any mercy from the king.

So, it wasn’t a surprise to me that Princess Angela took a stand against these oppressive laws. The city quickly stepped up its patrols, ripping down the posters. But what they didn’t realize was that the ones on the walls were just a distraction. Many more had been directly thrown into the yards of the townspeople.

We knew that the true power of the country lay with its people, not the officials. Gaining their support was crucial and urgent!

Changing deeply held beliefs wasn’t going to be easy—it needed a bigger push.

Around noon, Janet’s veil unexpectedly fell off as she was leaving a restaurant. The crowd reacted with a mix of fear and anger, some staring in shock while others glared at her with hostility, thinking she deserved her fate.

In her grief and rage, Janet wrote a poem on the spot, then bought a bottle of poison and headed to the crowded market. She climbed onto a platform, tears streaming down her face, and knelt.

She bowed three times and said, “Father, Mother, I am unworthy. I failed to live up to your expectations and let you down in life.”

“Yet what did I do wrong? Just showing my face has cost me my life!”

“In my next life, I’d rather be born an animal than live in this cursed dynasty.”

Then she drank the poison in one gulp. Soon after, she was writhing in pain and bleeding before she died.

After her death, I arranged for two people to handle her body. I was surprised to see that most of the women present had sympathetic looks, with very few showing indifference.

It seemed that the posters had made an impact. In the past, people would cheer and clap for the deaths of those on the platform, but this time, the applause was barely audible.

When I returned to Awakening Manor, Janet told me excitedly, “Emily, did you see? During my death on the platform, nearly seventy percent of the onlookers were women.”

I was surprised. “I’ve seen that in the past, when women committed suicide, the crowd was mostly men, with only a few women. This is a positive change!”

It was indeed a good sign! It showed that even these women were deeply unhappy with the current laws and yearned for freedom.

Janet, the rest of Awakening Manor, and I were all moved to tears. I hugged Janet and said, “You did an amazing job today.”

Using death to jolt people into action—that was Viola’s mother’s idea. Janet had agreed without hesitation, preparing meticulously for her role as the “deceased.”

The poison was fake, and the death was staged. Even the people handling the body were two strong women from Awakening Manor in disguise.